When the world stopped in 2020, it wasn’t just science that helped us survive — the humanities provided the medicine that healed our minds and hearts. In isolation and fear, we turned to stories, poems, songs and art. We reached for history to understand the moment, for literature to feel less alone and for shared memory to hold onto who we are. The humanities have always done this vital work: sustaining the soul of our nation through its most uncertain hours.
Recognizing this, the U.S. Congress established the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) in 1965 – another moment of crisis and division. The struggle for civil rights, the Vietnam War, the space race and the Cold War pulled the nation in different directions. In the midst of rapid technological advancement and political upheaval, the NEH was created to restore balance — to steady the pulse of a divided country and to ensure that our national progress didn’t come at the cost of our humanity. The founding legislation reminds us: “Democracy demands wisdom and vision in its citizens. It must, therefore, foster and support a form of education and access to the arts and the humanities designed to make people of all backgrounds and wherever located masters of their technology and not its unthinking servants.”
State humanities councils were created to make that vision real in every corner of the country — rural and urban, red and blue, young and old. The humanities aren’t a luxury. They are a lifeline. The humanities are the very heart of civic life — circulating memory and meaning through every community. When the heart is strong, the nation thrives. When it is weakened, we all suffer.
But what happens when the opportunities to explore art, history and literature are eliminated? What happens when our heart is stopped?
This is not a metaphorical question. It’s happening now, following the April 2 decision by the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) to eliminate humanities funding for all 50 states and 6 territories.
This decision lands during Utah Humanities’ 50th anniversary year. For half a century, we have served the people of Utah, supporting thousands of free events in every county. We are a model of efficiency, matching every federal dollar with at least two from other sources and working with partners to deliver programming that matters to the people who call Utah home. Everything we do is designed to bring communities together and strengthen our state’s cultural ecosystem. From The Utah Humanities Book Festival events across the state, to the Museum on Main Street program that brings Smithsonian exhibits to our rural communities, to regranting federal funds to support many of our smaller cultural organizations.
We have seen DOGE’s website, with its proud display of projected taxpayer savings. But where is the corresponding tally of lost jobs, shuttered programs and broken community ties? We’ve repeatedly heard the analogy that these cuts are like surgery — painful but necessary for healing. But you don’t need to be a surgeon to recognize that you can’t remove the patient’s heart and expect them to recover.
The humanities aren’t peripheral. They are central. They are what keeps a democracy alive — what keeps us alive. They remind us of our common humanity in an age of algorithms and artificial intelligence that can never replace the human soul. And once you remove the heart, the whole patient dies.
We still have a choice. We can choose a path that values people over profit, memory over metrics, and meaning over mere efficiency. Because the real question is not whether we can afford to support the humanities. It’s whether we can afford not to.
(Jodi Graham) Jodi Graham first came to Utah Humanities in 1996, and was appointed as Executive Director in March, 2018.
Jodi Graham first came to Utah Humanities in 1996, and was appointed as Executive Director in March, 2018. She is a certified Change Leader, and has served on the board of the Utah Cultural Alliance, the U of U College of Humanities Partnership Board, the U of U Bennion Center’s Student Directed Programs Committee, and the UVU Appomattox Project Advisory Board.
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